Thursday, September 14, 2017

"With a title taken from the poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins, the bestselling and award-winning novelist Alex Preston, most recently of the critically acclaimed In Love and War, talks about the inspiration behind his beautiful new book As Kingfishers Catch Fire.

A birdwatcher as a child, he began again in the books that he read, creating his own personal anthology of nature writing that brought the birds of his childhood back to brilliant life.

Looking for moments ‘when heart and bird are one’, Alex Preston weaves the very best writing about birds by writers from Keats to Ted Hughes, into a personal and eccentric narrative that is as much about the joy of reading and writing as it is about the thrill of wildlife.

Alex Preston appears regularly on BBC television and radio. He writes for GQ and Harper’s Bazaar as well as reviewing fiction for The Observer."

I have this book ready and waiting as a feast of glorious book production values along with page after page of colour that pleases the eye and prose to match, and now I have Alex Preston's presentation to remember. This was an interesting talk to follow on from Stephen Moss this morning, a literary bird trail at Budleigh along with a thoughtful take on the act of 'birding' (not twitching apparently). Mindfulness is something birders have been doing since time immemorial and one of the many bonuses of Alex Preston's talk was the highlighting of the poetry of Mary Oliver.

Mary Oliver known to many of us, but I hadn't realised that she wasn't actually published here in the U.K., though apparently that is about to be rectified, but the reading of her poem Wild Geese brought tears to every eye. This literary journey through twenty-one bird species is very special.

There was a good signing queue and throughout the rest of the afternoon, as people sat waiting for other events to start, I saw people furtively getting As Kingfishers Catch Fire out of their bags, staring at and stroking the cover and then having a quick peek inside. Curlew had the person in front of me entranced and I thought "Yes you are in for a real treat when you get home".

Comments

"With a title taken from the poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins, the bestselling and award-winning novelist Alex Preston, most recently of the critically acclaimed In Love and War, talks about the inspiration behind his beautiful new book As Kingfishers Catch Fire.

A birdwatcher as a child, he began again in the books that he read, creating his own personal anthology of nature writing that brought the birds of his childhood back to brilliant life.

Looking for moments ‘when heart and bird are one’, Alex Preston weaves the very best writing about birds by writers from Keats to Ted Hughes, into a personal and eccentric narrative that is as much about the joy of reading and writing as it is about the thrill of wildlife.

Alex Preston appears regularly on BBC television and radio. He writes for GQ and Harper’s Bazaar as well as reviewing fiction for The Observer."

I have this book ready and waiting as a feast of glorious book production values along with page after page of colour that pleases the eye and prose to match, and now I have Alex Preston's presentation to remember. This was an interesting talk to follow on from Stephen Moss this morning, a literary bird trail at Budleigh along with a thoughtful take on the act of 'birding' (not twitching apparently). Mindfulness is something birders have been doing since time immemorial and one of the many bonuses of Alex Preston's talk was the highlighting of the poetry of Mary Oliver.

Mary Oliver known to many of us, but I hadn't realised that she wasn't actually published here in the U.K., though apparently that is about to be rectified, but the reading of her poem Wild Geese brought tears to every eye. This literary journey through twenty-one bird species is very special.

There was a good signing queue and throughout the rest of the afternoon, as people sat waiting for other events to start, I saw people furtively getting As Kingfishers Catch Fire out of their bags, staring at and stroking the cover and then having a quick peek inside. Curlew had the person in front of me entranced and I thought "Yes you are in for a real treat when you get home".

Constants...

Team Tolstoy

Team TolstoyA year-long shared read of War & Peace through the centenary year of Count Lyev Nikolayevich Tolstoy's death, starting on his birthday, September 9th 2010.
Everyone is welcome to board the troika and read along, meeting here on the 9th of every month to chat in comments about the book.

Team Tolstoy BookmarkDon't know your Bolkonskys from your Rostovs?
An aide memoire that can be niftily printed and laminated into a double-sided bookmark.

Port Eliot Festival

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